Sports
Bandy: ice hockey with a difference hits Red Square
Published 08 February, 2009, 22:19
January 8 is the day of a truly Russian game – bandy. To mark the occasion an all-star bandy match has taken place on Moscow’s Red Square, where Dynamo Moscow took on a rest-of-the-world team.
The host team, which is celebrating its 85th anniversary, won.
Also known as ‘Russian hockey with a ball’, modern bandy was born in the 19th century in St Petersburg, and since then Russia's been the leading nation on the world circuit.
Bandy is a team game where a stick is used to strike the ball and thus to score a goal. It’s played on ice with the players skating, but it differs from ice hockey as the pitch is the size of a football field and each team consists of 11 players. In addition, a ball is used in place of the ice hockey puck.
Although bandy is not yet an Olympic discipline, organisers of the 2014 winter games in Sochi are hoping to hold a world championship at the same time as the Olympiad. Though yet to be finalised, the move is likely to find favour among bandy fans around the world.
